And running around the rest of the house as well. The life in my food, the food in my life, my life in food. My life is food? Eh, you get the idea.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

An interesting phenomenon

I've discovered an interesting phenomenon. I can't just "cook" anymore. As I'm making something for dinner (tonight was Sloppy Joes), in my head I'm wondering how it will convert to my new blog. Do I take pictures of each step? Are Sloppy Joes interesting enough? How can I be clever about Sloppy Joes?! What kind of title can I come up with? Even the individual ingredients lend themselves to tangents. I have a ground beef observation for all of you one day. I'll save it for another time when I haven't cooked anything. Phenomenon or sickness? It's too close to call.

Back to the Sloppy Joes. I don't remember where I got the recipe. I'm pretty sure it's from online somewhere. It's the perfect "make it and stick it in the fridge" food. It lends itself very well to reheating. And even the boy and girl will eat it. Mostly the girl, but the boy will eat a small helping. I used the celery from some bag 'o veggies in our past. I think it might be two weeks ago. Boy is my crisper effective! I even pulled a Jessica Seinfeld, and I grated up some carrots and added them. No one was the wiser. It's open to lots of variations. You can give it more tang, sweetness, or spice.

Here's the recipe:

Sloppy Joes

1 lb. ground beef or turkey

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 T. brown sugar

1 T. vinegar

1/2 c. diced onion

1 c. diced celery

1 grated carrot (sneaky!)

1 c. ketchup

1 T. flour (only if needed)

Brown the ground beef and garlic. Drain the fat. Combine the brown sugar and vinegar. Add to the browned meat. Stir. Add the onion, celery, and carrot and saute for a minute or two. Add the ketchup. Continue to cook until the vegetables are no longer crunchy. Depending on the amount of liquid in the pan, you may need to add the flour. If you'd like a thicker sauce, sprinkle on the flour. If you like it thinner, leave it alone. This is a very basic base recipe. You can substitute some BBQ sauce for the ketchup. You can add chili powder or hot sauce. You can add any extra vegetable that you might have hanging around.

We serve it over small dinner rolls. Well, the husband and I eat it over the rolls. The kids eat the rolls and meat separately. Barbarians.